Ramones' Monday

15 November 2010

Thus spake Dee Dee Ramone about the sixth track of the first Ramones' album. As the song he wrote was entitled "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue," he was, of course, speaking of the inexpensive, crude and terribly destructive method of copping a buzz by inhaling airplane model glue or similar products for the mind-twisting effects of the chemical toluene contained therein.

In the bizarre comic book world suggested by the Ramones' first three albums (and beyond, really, although their construct did not maintain its potency past the initial three LPs) the world is often divided into a visceral yin and yang of "don't wannas" and "wannas." On the first LP, "I Don't Wanna Go Down in the Basement" and "I Don't Wanna Walk Around with You" were balanced by "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" and Dee Dee's absurdly minimalist (even by the new standards in rock and roll minimalism established by the Ramones in their debut) cheer for this type of illicit crunching of your consciousness.

I love the middle part following the count off all the way up to eight. Dee Dee must have instinctually sensed the song needed just a touch more to actually be considered a whole song. Here they are doing the same song in their shambolic and unpolished incarnation about two years before they put out their first lp. Note at the very beginning the rare sight of Johnny Ramone actually smiling.

And here's what three years of practice and touring can do.

Of the song, drummer Tommy would remark that it would become "known as the first positive song from the album." Odd that he seems to forget one of his own compositions from the album in making that statement.

08 November 2010

It's Ramones Monday and we turn our attention to the fifth track on the first album. Chainsaw is one of the rare Johnny Ramone compositions found in the band's oeuvre. Lyrically this is a frustrated if not confused boy-meets-girl scenario superimposed over allusions to the '74 classic slasher horror movie, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (brilliantly phrased by Joey as "mass-uh-KREE"), the song opens with the whir of a genuine circular saw and—true to theme—buzzes through its duration (three seconds shy of two minutes) with just as much speed as a saw of the circular or chain variety.

Johnny is typically painted as the Ramone with more drive and will than imagination and, for me, those colors come through in this song. If I had a need to say this album had a weak link, I think I'd pick this tune. But, you know, I have no such need.